Love it or hate it, it's impossible to ignore Halo's legacy. With the exception of Super Mario, no other videogame series has been as critical to the success of its target platform - or as influential on the videogames industry as a whole.
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary Edition Urban jungle
Arguably the most important …

Ditto

I too, loved the old Xbox game, I have it lying around somewhere, its not in good condition, but that doesn't matter as both my old Xbox consoles have died. I'll probably buy this sometime anyway just to take me back. I hope the old gfx support wide screen.

Argh, I'll have to play it now on the 360 (its backwards compatible with some games).

See, how this works is people do some work to make a product, which they then put up for sale. People see the product, decide whether they think its worth the money, and if so, they buy it. If not, they don't. What exactly is your problem with this?

No price has been mentioned, so you can't be objecting because its too expensive, so presumably you're offended at the idea of someone charging any money at all for the work that they've been doing. Perhaps they should should have done it all for free? Yes, I can see where I've been going wrong here, demanding a salary for my time. I should work for my company for free, live on the street and rummage in bins for food, that would be far more socially responsible.

Wait a minute, there was a price mentioned. Ooops. The point still still stands, though. I probably wouldn't pay that much for it myself, since I played the original, but for someone who hasn't yet played the original, and want to see the start of the story, their choice is the ancients graphics version for a fiver, or shiny new one for £30. Most people in that situation would plump for the latter option, and they would be sensible to do so. I've tried playing Halo 2 on the XBox 360, didn't finish the first level because the graphics were so shit, compared to what I was used to. It does matter.

Fanboi Alert (me)

Been playing the Mac version since it came out (Halo:CE). There are still some people playing online on both PC and Mac. I find the Mac version plays fine. I finally 'bit the bullet' and bought an XBOX 360 console earlier this year (mainly due to there being no Oz players left on the PC/Mac and me getting constantly lag-killed online), then purchased Halo 2, Halo 3, ODST and Reach. Finished Reach and nearly all of Halo 2. I agree with the comment about Halo 2 graphics - looks worse on the console than on my iMac G5. Couldn't wait for the anniversary version to come out, made the mistake of ordering from overseas to keep the cost down so still waiting :-(

But that's ok, 'cos I downloaded the map pack for Reach today - yay

Horses for courses, I don't play very often so prefer to pick a game and thoroughly enjoy it, rather than jumping to whatever is this month's AAA title.

I understand the reasoning for using the Reach multiplayer engine, but some of the original maps are going to be a bit small to play with jetpacks etc (battle creek springs to mind).

already did

Don't have a 360 but couldn't help noticing the dig at the pistol.

The scoped pistol was an excellent fit for HALO - nice and powerful in a single shot and good at range, in the absence of a sniper rifle. The point is not that you're robbed of your Doom-obsession with seeking out a bigger gun but that the entire weapon set is perfectly balanced; the pistol is actually worth hanging onto on some levels even in the presence of automatic rifles. That HALO 2 threw away that perfect balance, and everyone else overlooks it, is the real travesty. So I'd suggest anyone who hasn't played the original, try it with a proper weapons set. And a shield/health mechanic that wasn't dumbed-down at the same time.

I tried reading the review but couldn't get past all that gushing on the first page. Hearing people call Halo the greatest game franchise of all time...hurts. It physically hurts. I've got games in my veins, and I thought the first Halo* was so ball-bustingly mediocre I was baffled by it ever getting a sequel, let alone a misty-eyed re-release.

I await your (inaccurate) cries of "Sony Fanboy!", but since gaming got popular, it's suffered from a bulging, sweaty mass of players with no goddamned taste.

I was always a PC gamer but...

the orginal Halo was one that I kept going back to. The way that the player character moved properly instead of skating on ice like PC FPS, the armour system that recharged (instead of having you limp about on 14% health) and the gun system ( you can have two, instead of trying to remember which of your 9 guns had more than 3 bullets in it) and the vehicles. Plus the plot, the music, the enemy AI...

Still, it got played to death, and I haven't yet decided to buy the Redux campaign or just download the multiplayer maps.

I echo the reviewers issue with the size of the levels... all the multiplayer maps in Halo Reach are too small, except for two of the add-ons... and are now mostly boring 'legoland' forgeworld types. It's almost as if 343i have hobbled Reach in preparation for Halo CE's release.

FAil

... just a couple of observations

Before Halo I was a PC FPS player and spent a stupid amount of time in Half Life and community mods. Then I downloaded the 'Silent Cartographer' demo level and was instantly converted. I went on to buy a second hand XBox to play Halo 2 and have continued to follow the Halo franchise ever since. I've also converted to console gaming.

It is absolutely true that an XBox 360 is nothing in graphics or processing power that a PC or a Mac can offer. But fwiw I simply can't be arsed fiddling around with graphics card settings, drivers, upgrades and all of that other stuff that is part of the PC gaming experience. I don't have much time to game - even less now my children camp out on Live in forge world or the minecraft clone they're playing - and the thought of spending any percentage of that time fiddling with PCs instead of having fun doesn't cut it with me. Both ODST and Reach graphics are more than sufficient to have a good time.

As to the sandbox criticism, I understand the comment having spent some time in Oblivion and Fallout (and Baldur's Gate, Morrowind, Neverwinter nights ...), and while it is true that the transition between battlefield set pieces is linear and ordered, once inside a battlefield the AI and weapon variations make for huge amounts of non-linearity. And when people refer to the 'Halo sandbox' they usually mean the overall game engine as a setting for custom map design. Slayer, CTF, Invasion, Zombies, Grifball, as solo, teams of 2, 4, 6, 8, or do you want to just race.

Each to their own as far as =getting= halo is concerned. Personally I adore all the nods to classic 70s space opera: the obvious links to Ringworld, Protector, Starship Troopers and even occasionally Forever War is just fantastic. I would have killed for this stuff when I was in my teens and I'm loving it now... each to their own.